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I don't really think they usurped Leica's market. Leica's market changed a while back.

Sometime, a decade or more past, Leica became the equivalent of Louis Vuitton or Rolex. It's a luxury item. Like a LV bag, is still a really well-made tool, but functionality is only secondary. The actual capabilities are less important than the ideas of craftsmanship and exclusivity.

Exactly. Leicas are Veblen goods.[1] Cameras that a lot of people, including A-list celebrities, like to be seen with.[2] Leica sells exclusivity, style, elegance. Fuji/Sony do not. You'll never see a $50k Fuji Edition Hermès. (Hell, Leica was even part-owned by Hermès for a little while.)

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veblen_good

[2] http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/20/fashion/leica-cameras-favo...

The correction on that NYT article is fantastic.

    A previous version of this article was accompanied
    by a picture of Emmy Rossum holding what was
    incorrectly identified as a Leica rangefinder. It
    was, in fact, a Fuji digital camera whose design
    was inspired by classic rangefinders such as the
    Leica.

Yep, the red dot is the new $10K handbag.

But it's mot than a luxury item. It's a camera revered by pro and semi pro photographers because of its history in the hands of some of the preeminent photographers of the 20th century.

From Cartier-Bresson, Robert Frank, Winogrand, Friedlander, Nachtwey, etc. Lots of up and coming photographers want to imitate the masters of the past and present and see they use Leicas --so even though photography has changed to them the manufacturer of choice remains Leica, if they can afford it. So it's a bit of traditionalism.

Here's how Leica describes their expensive new Leica M-P digital camera: "For connoisseurs who appreciate the details." Not photographers, "connoisseurs."

>But it's mot than a luxury item. It's a camera revered by pro and semi pro photographers because of its history in the hands of some of the preeminent photographers of the 20th century.

Actually only the history of the camera and the company is revered by pros. The camera not so much, and hasn't been for at least 2-3 decades.

And the people you describe were mostly "art photographers" and high-end story photographers for LIFE magazine, NG and such, not the typical (99.99%) of photojournalists and photographers in the field.

I agree completely. I own a Leica film camera, the M6, and I love it. I think the industrial design is spectacular, the image quality is great, and the unobtrusiveness of the camera lets me get shots I couldn't with a bigger film SLR.

But I can't imagine ever buying a Leica digital camera. They're overpriced, seemingly underpowered, and a far poorer investment than, say, a house.

Also, I should mention that as I write this, my X100s is sitting next to me, and its memory card's contents are being copied into Lightroom. Fuji's making absolutely amazing cameras with superb optics. Are they Leica-quality? Probably not, but I'd rather spend $1000 on an X-series camera than $10,000+ on an M with a first party lens.

Ditto. I've got an M6 TTL (though I don't use the built in meter, in fact, I've never put the meter's battery in, I use an external incident meter since slide film is rathe unforgiving and ... I'm not very good) and I would never buy a digital Leica.

That being said, the Mamiya/Sony digital format rangefinder rumor [0] sounds interesting but what has really piqued my interest is David Hobby's [2] preview of the Fuji X100T's Classic Chrome (read: Kodachrome), Velvia and Provia modes [3]. If I go digital, that's probably the first camera I'd look at.

[0] http://petapixel.com/2014/09/30/rumor-sony-mamiya-release-me...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Hobby

[3] http://petapixel.com/2014/09/10/classic-chrome-film-simulati...

the built in meter is perfectly capable of metering accurately enough for slide film. If you're not sure what you're doing just set the iso to exp comp about negative half a stop to avoid (as with digital) blowing out the highlights.

the meter in the camera is obviously reflected light only, so adjust if you're shooting black horses or white dresses. Just use common sense and meter a stop either way to compensate for the deviation from 18% grey.

I know the built in reflective meter works, I think it's more of a case of I went on vacation and ruined a bunch of photos so until I get better at interpreting contrasty scenes with the built in meter, the incident meter will remain my crutch.

Fuji and Sony's latest cameras are pretty amazing, feature full cameras at cheap prices. I bought and used the Fuji line for the last year, always hoping it would replace my desire for a Leica.

But in the end I use my Leica M. For the simple reason that it is a camera that allows me to manually control it without compromise. I can focus it faster than any autofocus, I can feel the exposure and set it before I raise it to my eye, and the lenses look like butter.

Yes, their price is about double of the equivalent of my Canon SLR and lens, but that's a small premium to pay for a camera that melds manual controls with my mind.

For many buying a Leica is like buying a Louis Vuitton bag, but it is still the best working camera out there for it's specialized purpose.

Source, I'm a working photojournalist based in Egypt: www.DavidDegner.com

I have used an Olympus E-P2 and Sony RX100. These are good cameras, but not great, and not approaching a Leica M for one reason: the viewfinders (or lack thereof).

An optical viewfinder is an essential feature which connects the shooter to the subject in a way that cannot be matched by an LCD. And while the beloved Fuji X100(s) has an optical viewfinder, it has a pathetic 90% coverage and 0.5x magnification. This makes a big, big difference in the active, engaged, photo-journalistic work that Leica is known for.

For six years I shot with an Olympus E-1 DSLR. It's lame by today's digital standards, with only 5MP, but it was far better as a tool for making images than any of these no-, small-, or electronic viewfinder cameras.

Example work from one afternoon with the 5 MP E-1: https://www.flickr.com/photos/jzwinck/sets/72157594149676636...

Nice shots. I especially like the 2 pictures of the women in the rain, and I'm a sucker for nice cloud photos.

I wholeheartedly concur, the E-1 is as close to Leica-like quality as any camera I've used. In one way the E-1 is superior: the ergonomics of the E-1 surpass Leica RF. I say this from experience, I still own an E-1 and an M6.

Nowadays I mainly use an EM-1. With the 12-40mm attached, the experience comes close to the E-1 with 14-54mm. The EM-1 is more compact, lighter weight, and image quality is way ahead. Not quite the same "feel", but on balance excellent overall.

>For decades Leica made expensive but advanced cameras suitable for use by pros in the field.

Actually it has been decades that Leica has done that. Their last period of relevance for "pros in the field" was in the seventies or so.

With the advent of proper autofocus DSLRS and similar advances in light metering etc, it hasn't been the right tool for photojournalists (and even travel photographers etc) ever since.

I completely agree,

I had a film Leica and then bought an M9P, they're so vastly different in usage, it's almost hilarious.

Almost everything, except how the camera looks from the front, was lost. The shutter sound is atrociously loud and annoying sounding. Tons of firmware issues, I have missed many shots simply because the camera just hanged up, and needed a battery re-insert. The M9 is noticably bulkier than any of the film Leica's, also it's just as heavy as any fullframe DSLR.

You see Leica coming out with weird cameras such as the T, and you just have to facepalm. What they really need to do to combat the Fuji / Sony cameras coming out is to release a small fixed lens camera with a 35 summicron or summilux equivalent (like a digital Contax T3). I doubt that this will happen since whoever is in charge now has no brand vision.

Going to get a XT1 as soon as possible.

My Flickr if you're curious: http://flickr.com/photos/moarbokeh

With all that being said, this is a nice implementation of a timeline, it might be more epic if the site had a black or dark background, white text, and red accents.

I love my X-T1 and X100s. I think you'll be incredibly happy with the X-T1, especially with a 56mm ƒ/1.2. I dumped my 5D Mark II for it, and haven't had any regrets. My Flickr: https://www.flickr.com/photos/aaronbrethorst

You know, there's something about these damn Fujifilm cameras. My Finepix F100fd knocked out perfectly exposed shots, with fantastic color and skin-tones all day.

Even my GF1 can't seem to manage the same thing, though my D70 does pretty good.

The GF1 was good but it was a very early generation m43, any recent one from Panasonic or Olympus gives much better performance overall and will easily outperform your D70 (I moved from GF1 to E-M10 a few months ago).

While the design and function of the Leica body is not to be dismissed, the real differentiator as far as I always understood it was the glass. The camera body is just a shutter and film carrying mechanism for the lens, and the Leica/Leitz lenses were what really made those famous images.

Both really. A number of cameras can use Leica lenses with an adapter, and since it's manual focusing anyway, there is less penalty in doing so than one would think.

But until Fuji came with its X series, Leica was the only game in town for rangefinders. The use of a rangefinder arguably helps for some styles of photography, especially street shooting and portraits. This alone could be worth a lot depending on what one gets from photography. The was a good review by Steve Huff detailing all of that [1]

Also, until Sony pushed its more compact line up, full frame cameras were bulky ugly heavy tanks riddles with buttons everywhere (like the Nikon D3 [0] for instance). Leica cameras were the odd simple and straight to the point tools blessed by top notch sensor technology.

[0]http://kenrockwell.com/nikon/d3.htm [1]http://www.stevehuffphoto.com/2010/08/04/my-updated-big-bad-...

since it's manual focusing anyway, there is less penalty in doing so than one would think.

That's true, but the variability is much greater than is commonly appreciated: http://www.lensrentals.com/blog/2014/07/sensor-stack-thickne... :

While I don’t have a mathematical formula to predict how well a given lens will work on a given camera, it should be apparent that wide-angle rangefinder lenses designed for film are going to struggle, especially on m4/3 cameras, but to some degree on other cameras. Longer focal length rangefinder lenses tend to have longer exit pupil distances and should do better. Stopping down to f/4 or f/8 should reduce the problem significantly, although it isn’t guaranteed to eliminate it near the edges of the frame.

SLR lenses may also have some troubles on m4/3 cameras, since there’s nearly a 2mm difference in stack thickness. They shouldn’t have as much of a problem as rangefinder lenses, though, since they are designed for a 2mm sensor stack and they tend to have longer exit pupil distances. Older lenses designed for film cameras will tend to have more issues, of course, since they were designed for no sensor stack.

the fuji x series are NOT RANGEFINDERS! they are auto focus cameras and support manual focus with the EVF. They might look a little like rangefinders (in that they mostly don't have "hump" for the pentaprism which is an SLR feature) but they do not have coupled rangefinder focusing like the Leica does. Leica are the only rangefinder digital cameras (besides the now ancient Epson R-D1)

So much misinformation as usual anytime anything comes up about photography.

yes rangefinders are prefered (or were) by street photographers because the cameras and lighter and smaller, the lenses too, with the mirror box to overcome the lenses can focus much closer to the rear lens element which makes for lighter, smaller lenses. The main reason for their success in street and journalistic photography was because what is moving into and out of the frame is visible at all times, and in crisp clear focus, no matter where the lens is focused. if you shooting a tank rolling into the city center its better to know what else is going on around you and you don't want to have to focus the camera before realizing you're going to get run down by an M1A1 Abrams.

Please let's confuse retrostyled with rangefinder. That doesn't the Fuji X series aren't good, they are, for an APS-C sensor they are decent performers with some nice lenses.

Yes, the Leica is, unfortunately, the only digital rangefinder camera that exists at this point in time (I own both an M9 and an X100s. See my photography at <http://simongriffee.com>).

The great advantage of a rangefinder is this: With some practice and experience you can _reliably focus_ the camera _without putting it to your eye or pointing it at the subject_. You can do this because the lens rotation stops at both far and close focus points and you can judge the focus distance by feeling the relative position of the finger tab on the lens, or by looking at the distance markings on the lens.

The other advantage of the Leica is the simplicity of the manual controls necessary for photography: Aperture, shutter speed, focus, shutter release. Unfortunately Leicas are becoming increasingly complex with the addition of video and so on to the M model. Not that I mind new designs, but I think they should also make a more affordable model focussed on simplicity above all, something like [this](http://hypertexthero.com/logbook/2013/09/design-good-camera/).

When I am asked what camera is best to learn photography with I always want to and do recommend a Leica, but I do it with a heart weighed down by the knowledge of the price of the thing.

Lots of people say that cameras are just light-proof boxes :)

Part of the Leica/Leitz history is that they single-handidly popularized the 35mm format. Before that, if you wanted decent photos, chances are you were dragging around a large format rig with bellows, ground glass, etc all on a tripod.